You Wrecked Me Because I Let You

I never intended to fall in love with you.

For all of my life, loving someone who loved me back was mission one. 

I kissed a lot of princesses looking for the one who would change me from a frog.

I dated many people looking for the piece to complete me.

In time, losing you put me on the path to understand that those were foolish hope of an easy way out.

I was the one who kept me enchanted. I was the one who did not see I was complete.

That process took years. And it hurt. And I missed you the entire time.

That summer evening, I knew I was leaving town in a couple of months. 

I put my search for the one on pause. I gave myself permission to just be me.

One date. Ice cream. A movie. A kiss. 

You were so beautiful inside and out. You were the first to undo the locks around my heart.

I knew you were the one for me, and I could not imagine any other outcome.

You, on the other hand, were inexperienced. You did not know what you wanted. 

That Friday in September we were just over 100 miles apart but you were coming to me.

I had missed you so much that I did not have words to express it.

That Friday I was tempted. I was with someone else and the vibe was clear that a kiss would not be unwelcome.

I refused. I knew enough, had many enough mistakes, that I knew I was not going to lose you.

You were in a similar circumstance just to the north and made a different choice.

Oh cruel irony. Oh just karma. Payback is a bugger.

I am sure all my friends believed I would be the one to stray and leave.

It was my pattern. I had a history.  But patterns are meant to be broken. The future is unwritten.

When you arrived that night for my birthday, the cake you brought was not enough to hide that something had changed.

It took a bit to get your confession. Even then I gave you a choice. You did not choose us.

I thought I knew sadness. I thought I knew the dark. 

Until that moment, my regrets were about bad choices I had made. Unforced errors.

Loving you with absolute trust was not a bad choice. It was not an error.

Even though it meant I had no barriers or walls to hold back the searing pain of losing you.

You wrecked me because I let you, and I have never regretted that love.

Not even during the dark times.

Five months later I stood on a bridge flipping a coin to help me decide what to do.

I lived. I made it through even though the worst was yet to come.

What happened next was not your cause and effect, but I wonder if your love would have made it better.

I just know that we were together for three months and it has taken three decades to get over you.